In my last blog, I wrote about the first of the 4Ps of marketing. These four Ps are some of the fundamentals of marketing that underpin many of the best campaigns. Click here to read P is for Price and how best to use pricing to promote your business.

Number 2 = Product

So now onto the second P of Product. What do you actually sell and how do you go about promoting it?

When you sell a product, that is what you sell. Whatever it is, you can talk about the size of the product, the colour, the features it has that makes it better than something similar that your competitors sell. However, when you provide a service, it’s a very different story. Services are intangible and include coaching, consultancy of all types, training and speaking. A service is something that you can’t see or touch. Very often, clients have to pay for a service before they receive the benefit of it – you have to pay for your training course before you attend it. So if you’re the training provider, your challenge is persuade your potential client to part with their money before they really know what they’re going to get.

And what exactly are they going to get? Are you really selling consultancy or coaching? No – you’re selling your time, your experience and your expertise. You’re selling a solution to your potential client’s problem. You’re selling something that will take away the pain they are feeling and help them do something different.

But isn’t that what all the other consultants and coaches are selling? Yes – and that’s where your marketing needs to be really focused on what makes your solution better than and different to that of your competitors. Because the thing that really makes your consultancy different to other consultants is You. Your USP (Unique Selling Point) is actually You! You need to rely on your reputation and the particular experience and expertise that you bring to your clients. You need to put yourself into your marketing, so that your potential clients really get to know you and trust that you can help them to solve their problems.

All of this means that when you’re selling a service – time, expertise and experience – the sort of marketing that is going to work best is the sort that shows off your expertise and experience. Networking, speaking, writing articles, sharing tips on Twitter … but not advertising in a magazine or putting up a poster.

In order for your marketing to be really effective, you need to understand what it is that you’re selling. When you’re clear on that, you can focus your marketing efforts in the right places.

In the third blog in this series, we’ll look at the next of the 4Ps – Place: where can your clients buy what you sell and how does that affect your marketing?